Abstract
Exhumations aim to restore victims’ dignity because they constitute a step towards their individualisation and recognition as members not only of a particular family but of the human family. This article aims to contribute to the critical assessment of how the notion of human dignity and dignification are used in the context of mechanisms of transitional justice, such as exhumations. It focuses on the Colombian case from an interdisciplinary perspective based on socio-legal studies. The research is based on participant observation, interviews, and thematic analysis of the uses of the term dignity and dignification in the texts of the laws and protocols for the exhumations of victims of the armed conflict in Colombia. It explores two dimensions of dignification, which in turn contributes to the understanding of the complex relationship between victims, the state, and institutions of transitional justice.
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Notes
Humphrey (2018: 470) argues that ‘The state has tapped into Colombians’ faith in rights, advanced through the ‘constitutionalization of everyday life’, to turn transitional justice into the administration of hope of long human rights queues’. This is a legal fetishism and an idealization of human rights institutions that is not realizable in practice.
A tool created by the government as part of the system of attention and assistance to victims. Although sometimes there is dispute between the official numbers of victims presented by the Registry and those managed by victims’ organizations, the Registry is generally used as a reference by most actors.
Personal Interview, Lina Rondon Daza, 15 September 2016, Bogotá.
Personal interview, victim, Bogotá, June 2020.
Personal Interview, victim, Bogotá, September 2020.
For more information on this case, see Author: 2015.
Equitas (Equipo Colombiano Interdisciplinario de Trabajo Forense y Asistencia Psicosocial—Colombian Interdisciplinary Team of Forensic Work and Psychosocial Assistance) www.equitas.org.co
Fieldwork notes, November 2019.
The Mesa Psicosocial is constituted by Corporación AVRE (Acompañamiento Psicosocial y Atención a Víctimas de la Violencia política), Tejidos del Viento, Costurero de la Memoria: Kilómetros de vida, Colectivo Ansur, CAPS (Centro de Atención Psicosocial), Corporación Vínculos, Comisión Intereclesial de Justicia y Paz, Colectivo Sociojurídico Orlando Fals Borda, Colectivo Psicosocial Colombiano Copsico, Corporación Claretiana Norman Pérez Bello, Diego Fernando Abonia V, Carmen Sánchez.
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Acknowledgements
I am thankful to Valérie Rosoux for her insightful comments. I am always grateful to the participants that generously accepted to be interviewed for this research and those who allowed me to participate in their meetings and ceremonies of memorialization in Colombia.
Funding
This research is part of the FNRS postdoctoral grant entitled ‘How Transitional Justice helps to restore victims’ human dignity: The case of Colombian Truth Commission, Memory, and Reparations’, October 2018–December 2021.
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Rios Oyola, S.M. Dignification of Victims Through Exhumations in Colombia. Hum Rights Rev 22, 483–499 (2021). https://doi.org/10.1007/s12142-021-00632-2
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s12142-021-00632-2